The Harry Reid Scandals

Investors Business Daily via Glenn Reynolds:

We never cease to be amazed at the double standard applied to the morals and ethics of Democrats and Republicans in Congress. We've already commented on how Republican Mark Foley was forced to resign for sending lewd e-mails to congressional pages, while Democrat Gerry Studds received mere censure and standing ovations after actually having sex with one, being allowed to serve until he decided to retire.

But the case of Senate Minority Leader Reid is a double standard on steroids. The latest episode is his request to file an "amended" ethics statement after the Associated Press revealed he made $1.1 million on a $400,000 investment on property he hadn't owned for three years; it was the subject of an earlier editorial on these pages. . . .

OK, fine. But why the double standard and the hypocrisy? Is anybody investigating Harry Reid?

We remember the feeding frenzy over former House Speaker Newt Gingrich's alleged violation of federal tax law in using tax-exempt funds to fund his allegedly political college course, "Renewing American Civilization."

After a 3 1/2-year ordeal, and a $300,000 fine paid to the House Ethics Committee, the IRS finally ruled that the sponsoring organization, the Progress and Freedom Foundation, "did not serve the private interests of Mr. Gingrich" and was both apolitical and completely legal.

Which is more than you can say about Reid's shenanigans. Gingrich wasn't offered a "do-over" or the opportunity to amend anything. In his case, it was sentence first, trial later. But then, unlike Reid, he was both innocent and a Republican.

The First -- and last -- Theocon President

The First -- and last -- Theocon President [Jonah Goldberg]

“There is a mighty task before us and it welds us together. It is to make the United States a mighty Christian Nation, and to Christianize the world.”

— Woodrow Wilson.

Stop the Theocrats!!!!!

Those Polls

From The Corner on NR:

From today's White House Bulletin... [Rich Lowry]

a point that has been noted in this space before:
* Recent Polls Outside The Historical Norm For Party ID. A spate of recent polls paints a very gloomy electoral outlook for GOP candidates in next month's elections. One reason for that, possibly, is a set of samples in recent polls that do not mirror the historical norm for party ID. A memo circulating among Republicans on the Hill, authored by GOP pollster David Winston, takes a look at the historical spread between Democrats and Republicans in House elections and polling over the last 14 years. According to Winston's analysis, there is a material discrepancy between the party identification listed by people in exit polls (people who actually voted) between 1992 and 2004, and those used over the last few weeks.

In most of the years between 1992 and 2004, Democrats held a slight advantage in party ID. Winston based his data on VNS/Media exit surveys, and concluded in 1992, Democrats held a 3 point advantage; in 1996, they held a 4 point advantage; in 1998, a 1 point advantage; and in 2000, a 3 point advantage. In two election years, 1994 and 2004, the percentages of people identifying themselves as Republicans and Democrats were identical, i.e., no advantage to either party. 2002 was the only year in which Republicans held an advantage over Democrats, with 40% identifying themselves to exit pollsters as Republicans and 38% identifying themselves as Democrats.

In short, between 1992 and 2004, only once did one party enjoy an advantage as large as 4 points over the other in party ID. But in recent polling samples used by eight different polling organizations (USA Today/Gallup, CBS/NYTimes, ABC/Washington Post, CNN/Opinion Research, Newsweek, AP/Ipsos, Pew, and Time), the Democratic advantage in the sample surveyed was never less than 5 points. All these organizations conducted surveys in early October. According to Winston, the Democrats held the following party ID advantages in these early-October surveys:

* USAToday/Gallup: 9 points.
* CBS/NYT: 5 points
* ABC/WP: 8 points
* CNN: did not provide sample party ID details.
* Newsweek: 11 points.
* AP/Ipsos: 8 points.
* Pew: 7 points.
* Time: 8 points.

Party registrations shift over time, and many political operatives believe the country starts to gravitate away from a party that has been in power over an extended period of time. Republicans have controlled the House since 1995. Winston acknowledges that possibility in his memo, writing, "It is certainly not out of the realm of possibility that this year's election could fall outside of historical results, but any survey that does should acknowledge that the data presented are based on a foundation that reflects a structural shift in the way the electorate identifies itself with a party."

Here's more from Big Lizards:

How much to weight for party ID is a weighty question for a very weighty reason: if poll samples consistently come up with significantly more Democrats and Independents than voted in the last comparable election (and consequently fewer Republicans), does that mean that a bunch of registered Republicans now consider themselves more in the Independent or Democratic camps -- hence will vote that way -- or does it mean there is an unidentified but systemic bias in the sample selection that will disappear when voters actually go to the polls?

In other words, should polls be weighted to "correct" the typical "oversampling" in favor of the Left in the pool of Rs, or does that supposed oversampling actually reflect true voter intent -- hence should not be eliminated by weighting?

And there is a related question that even further complicates the situation: assume some number of Republicans are mad at the party, so when asked their party affilliation, they say "Independent" or even "Democrat," and when asked who they will vote for, they say "Casey." What percent of them will, in the end, come back to the fold and vote for Santorum, even if they must hold their noses while doing so? After all, if you believe that a person will "switch" his party affilliation one direction, then he could jolly well switch it back in the voting booth, too.

The reality is that the percent of overpolled Democrats and Independents who are in fact "false-flag" voters -- voters who say they're one party while actually being another -- is neither 0% or 100%; nor will all the false-flaggers actually vote for Democrats:

Religion, Rhetoric, and the Presidency: A Conversation with Michael Gerson

MICHAEL GERSON in President Bush's speechwriter. He gave a talk to reporters sponsored by the Pew Center. It's worth reading the whole thing, but the disconnect between the press and the people is nowhere more evident that in this section:

A fourth category are literary allusions to hymns and scripture. In our first inaugural, we had "when we see that wounded traveler on the road to Jericho, we will not pass to the other side;" or "there is power, wonder-working power in the goodness and idealism and faith of the American people" in the State of the Union.

I've actually had, in the past, reporters call me up on a variety of speeches and ask me where are the code words. I try to explain that they're not code words; they're literary references understood by millions of Americans. They're not code words; they're our culture. It's not a code word when I put a reference to T.S. Eliot's Choruses From the Rock in our Whitehall speech; it's a literary reference. And just because some don't get it doesn't mean it's a plot or a secret. (Laughter.)

I remember one incident in the last election when Frank Bruni - who is one of my favorite people; I really like and respect him - wrote on the front page of The New York Times that the president had said in an interview, actually - not a speech - that people should take the log out of their own eye before taking the speck out of their neighbor's eye. And Frank, writing on the front page of The New York Times, called this an odd version of the pot calling the kettle black. (Laughter.) Neither he nor his editors knew it was from one of the most famous sermons in history, and the part of the New Testament that's in red. (Laughter.) But actually, most Americans knew and the disconnect was not particularly - I don't think - the president's fault.

The Progressives:"...three cheers for the inventors of poison gas.”

Jonah Goldberg reminds us what the Enlightened if the last century REALLY believed about their fellow men:

“If I had my way, I would build a lethal chamber as big as the Crystal Palace, with a military band playing softly, and a Cinematograph working brightly, and then I’d go out in back streets and main streets and bring them all in, all the sick ... the maimed; I would lead them gently, and they would smile me a weary thanks ...”

That was D. H. Lawrence daydreaming about population control. He was hardly alone. During the so-called Progressive Era, “enlightened” social planners were convinced that overpopulation was the gravest problem facing Western society. That’s why Lawrence gave “three cheers for the inventors of poison gas.”

George Bernard Shaw, a thoroughgoing eugenicist, believed that the “the majority of men at present in Europe have no business to be alive.” H. G. Wells smiled at the prospect that the “swarms of black and brown and dirty-white and yellow people” will “have to go.” In America, Wells’s onetime girlfriend, Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, argued that birth control was essential to stem the rising tide of the unfit. Leading feminists, Progressive economists and legal theorists shared a similar vision. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, who concluded in the case of Buck v. Bell that the state had the power to forcibly sterilize “defectives,” believed that forced population control was at the very heart of Progressive reform.

The Holocaust diminished the popularity of eugenics, but the panic over overpopulation endured. Paul Ehrlich, author of the scaremongering “The Population Bomb,” predicted in 1970 that between 1980 and 1989, roughly 4 billion people, including 65 million Americans, would starve or otherwise meet their doom in the “Great Die-Off.” Inspired by such fears, Alan Guttmacher, the former president of Planned Parenthood, was a champion of coerced birth control — i.e. “compulsory sterilization and compulsory abortion” — throughout much of the world.

Read the whole thing...

The Laughing Traitor

Investors Business Daily comments on the Lynne Stewart case:

Three days after 9/11, as the ruins of the World Trade Center still smoldered with thousands entombed in the rubble, President Bush declared at the National Cathedral: "We make no distinction between terrorists and those who knowingly harbor or provide aid and comfort to them."

He could have been speaking of Lynne Stewart, attorney for Omar Abdel-Rahman, the "blind sheikh." Rahman was the architect of the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 in which a truck bomb in the parking garage was intended to topple one tower into the other, killing tens of thousands. It almost happened.

Besides masterminding the 1993 attack, Rahman planned to blow up the Lincoln and Holland tunnels and the George Washington Bridge, as well as assassinate the president of Egypt. Since the Clinton administration, in its finite wisdom, decided to treat this as a crime and not a terrorist Pearl Harbor, the sheikh had the right to an attorney.

National Lawyers Guild member Stewart was recruited to defend Rahman by none other than LBJ's former attorney general, Ramsey Clark. Among his other claims to infamy, Clark volunteered to be on Saddam Hussein's legal team, saying the mass murderer was a victim of "selective prosecution."

Stewart wasn't content to simply be of counsel. She made the conscious decision to help Rahman carry out his murderous agenda from his prison cell by passing communications between Rahman to his followers in the Islamic Group, an Egyptian terrorist group.

In February 2005, after 13 days of deliberation and six months of testimony, Stewart was found guilty of "facilitating and concealing communications" between Rahman and his fellow terrorists. Specifically, she was convicted of smuggling into prison a message to Rahman from terrorist Rifal Ahman Tara. The message asked Rahman to support renewed Islamic violence in Egypt.

As the New York Post reports, Stewart then smuggled back a coded dispatch that led to the dissolution of a cease-fire between Rahman's Islamic Group and the Egyptian government. On the stand, she failed to exercise her right to remain silent, proclaiming support for Rahman's violent cause, saying: "I believe that entrenched institutions will not be changed except by violence. I believe in the politics that lead to violence being exerted by people on their own behalf."

Enter Clinton-appointed U.S. District Judge John Koeltl. Addressing the traitor before him, Koeltl hailed Stewart as a "lawyer to the poor and the unpopular," and added: "It is no exaggeration to say that Ms. Stewart performed a public service, not only to the court but to the nation."

Baker Said Iraq Is "helluva mess", the BBC reported?

In a trifecta for unattributed reporting, the BBC finds the Baker Commission a convenient tool for creating the aura of defeat around Iraq.

It begins:

Former US secretary of state James Baker was visibly shocked when he last visited Iraq, and said the country was in a "helluva mess", the BBC reported.

Who testified to his physical shock? No one knows.

It is impossible to parody the rest of the story as a forest of anonymous sources:

1. Citing a unnamed close friend and ally of Baker's

2. Citing unnamed members of Baker's committee

3. ...one participant

But then this is the BBC whose reputation, along with the NY Times, Reuters and the International Red Cross (of faked ambulance pictures fame) is in the toilet along with the famous Koran that was never flushed at Gitmo.

The Price of Defeat and Betrayal

Realists exist in a freeze-frame reality—blind to the long-term consequence of cold, calculating, short-term decisions. Several argue for a pull-out from Iraq. Discussions of time tables and phases are mere spin for withdrawal. It’s too easy to forget or ignore the human costs of such a decision, or the sense of betrayal which we telegraph around the world. In his history of the 1970s, my colleague David Frum relates the story of Sirik Matak, whom the US embassy in Phnom Penh offered to evacuate as the Khmer Rouge closed in on the city. Matak refused, writing this letter to the US ambassador. It should be a must read for the “abandon Iraq” crowd:

Dear Excellency and Friend,

I thank you very sincerely for your letter and for your offer to transport me towards freedom. I cannot, alas, leave in such a cowardly fashion. As for you, and in particular for your great country, I never believed for a moment that you would have this sentiment of abandoning a people which has chosen liberty. You have refused us your protection, and we can do nothing about it. You leave, and my wish is that you and your country will find happiness under this sky. But, mark it well, that if I shall die here on this spot and in my country that I love, it is no matter, because we all are born and must die. I have only committed the mistake of believing you.

The Khmer Rouge shot Matak in the stomach. He took three days to die.

May God forgive me, I have an abiding contempt and hatred for the Congress that abandoned South Viet Nam and the vile creatures, like John Kerry and Jane Fonda, that created the political situation in this country that led to that decision.

For those who were not alive during that time, we not only left Viet Nam but cut off supplies so that they could no longer fight back.

A crime was committed but, like Stalin's willing executioners, the criminals are proud of their handiwork. there must be a special place in Hell for such creatures.

L.A. Times Columnist: Hooray for Violence! At Least They’re Doing Something!

A controversial figure speaks at Columbia University, and students rush the stage, start a brawl, and shut down the speech.

And L.A. Times columnist Meghan Daum applauds:

THE EVENTS at Columbia University on Oct. 4, in which about a dozen students stormed a stage where the founder of an anti-illegal immigration group was speaking, didn’t exactly resemble those of April 1968. There were no arrests, no soundtrack by the Grateful Dead, no occupation of the president’s office. But considering that most young people are considered to be politically apathetic, you have to credit the Chicano Caucus and the International Socialist Organization for trying.



Via Patterico

Global warming: the chilling effect on free speech

The demonisation of 'climate change denial' is an affront to open and rational debate.

Read the whole thing.

Mark Steyn: An election Foley-equipped with frivolity

Who is James Vicini? Well, he works for Reuters, the storied news agency. By "storied," I don't mean in the Hans Christian Andersen sense, though these days it's hard to tell. But they have an illustrious history and they're globally respected and whatnot. And last week newshound Vicini got assigned quite an interesting story:


"WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- A California-born convert to Islam, accused of making a series of al-Qaida propaganda videos, became on Wednesday the first American charged with treason since the World War II era, U.S. Justice Department officials said.
"Fugitive Adam Gadahn, 28, who is believed to be in Pakistan, was accused of treason, which carries a maximum punishment of death . . ."

Wow! Treason! First time in half-a-century, since the Tokyo Rose days. Since then, of course, the very word "treason" has come to seem arcane, if not obsolescent, like something some fellow in doublet-and-hose might accuse somebody of on "Masterpiece Theatre" but otherwise not terribly relevant and frankly no big deal: Indeed, the campus left usually gives the impression that "treason" is little more than an alternative lifestyle, like transvestism.

Yet the Justice Department wants this fellow over in Pakistan for treason. Now why would they do such a thing? After chugging through the various charges, Vicini got to the meat of his story: "Justice Department officials denied the case was timed to deflect attention from the fallout over lewd computer messages sent by a former Republican congressman to young male aides, a scandal that may help Democrats seize control of Congress in the Nov. 7 elections."

Cut out that paragraph and have it framed. Or now that the nights are drawing in, if you're at a loose end of an evening, sew it into an attractive sampler and hang it in your parlor. In years to come, you'll spend many precious moments treasuring it as the perfect summation of the 2006 U.S. election.

Read the whole thing.

Jesus or the Church

Rod Dreher, a columnist for NR, gives an intensely personal and moving account of his conversion from Catholicism to Orthodoxy. It is a long and, to me, fascinating read.

What his journey underscores is the need in our lives of a community of faith that regularly reinforces our faith in God. If that community is weak, or if its message is uncertain, our faith eventually dissolves and we are left defenseless against the “World” which each and every moment tells us that we are alone, that we live in the present, that there is no God and no future.

If, as too often happens, the church we attend is not only spiritually empty, but actually works to destroy our faith, the results can be devastating.

Worth reading, including the comments.

I also despaired over raising children in the Catholic faith. Julie and I decided not to put our kids in the Sunday School program at the parish when she learned that the parish was allowing women who didn't even go to mass to teach the faith to children, as part of their obligation to do parish service in exchange for reduced tuition at the parish school. This whole Sacrament Factory approach to living the Christian life left me ice-cold. I started to see my own faith and relationship to the Catholic Church as a purely mechanical thing. I'd go to fulfill my Sunday duty, receiving the Eucharist and then getting the heck out of there, wanting as little as possible to do with parish life. One day, in tears, Julie and I confessed to each other that we were afraid we were losing our faith entirely. This is not a place either of us ever imagined being. To know that you have the responsibility to raise children as followers of Christ, to say nothing about having responsibility for your own eternal soul -- well, to be in that position and to be so alienated from the Church you believe has the right to command your fidelity is a terrible thing.

Great Cuban Joke

From NR Online a great Cuban joke:

On a recent visit to Cuba, Vladimir Putin found that most Cubans' shoes have holes in them, and so he asked Fidel, "Oye chico, how is this possible after 40 years of 'progress'?"

Annoyed, Fidel answers, "And what about Russia? Have you done any better?"

Putin says, "Ombe, When you want I'll invite you to Russia and if you find a single person with ripped-up shoes you have permission to kill him. No problems."

They got on Putin's plane and went to Russia. As soon as Fidel got off the plane, the first thing he saw was someone whose shoes were all ripped up, and so he grabbed his pistol and BOOM! killed him.

The following day, Russian newspapers carried this banner headline: "Old Bearded Man Kills Cuban Ambassador in Moscow Airport."

When Multilateralism Falls Short

Jonah Goldberg, writing in NR Online, reminds us that the truth is not found in numbers; that getting people on your side does not make your side right and, conversely, if you are alone you are not therefore wrong.

The Jimmy Carter vision holds that North Korea’s nukes are coupons to be redeemed for groceries. But the North Koreans pocketed U.S. concessions after face-to-face talks in 1994 and continued pursuing nukes because ... they wanted nukes. Bush’s strategy has been, first, to declare that advances in North Korea’s nuclear program are “unacceptable” and then do nothing, and second, to insist that the U.S. can’t accomplish anything because our “partners” won’t cooperate.

The North Korea dilemma — much like the threat of Islamic fanaticism – is Aesopian. The frog in Aesop’s fable did not wish to be stung by the scorpion. The scorpion’s position? Wishing’s got nothing to do with it. Americans tend to think — and Europeans consider it gospel — that all differences can be negotiated. The truth is that only negotiable problems can be negotiated. Just ask Hamas if everything can be bargained for around a table. Their one non-negotiable principle is that Israel must cease to exist. Beyond that, they’re open to all sorts of creative proposals.

NUREMBERG-STYLE TRIALS PROPOSED FOR GLOBAL WARMING SKEPTICS

DRUDGE links to a Senate committee report:

A U.S. based environmental magazine that both former Vice President Al Gore (http://gristmill.grist.org/print/2006/9/19/11408/1106?show_comments=no ) and PBS newsman Bill Moyers, for his October 11th global warming edition of “Moyers on America” titled “Is God Green?”

(http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2006/05/09/roberts/index.html ) have deemed respectable enough to grant one-on-one interviews to promote their projects, is now advocating Nuremberg-style war crimes trials for skeptics of human caused catastrophic global warming.

Grist Magazine’s staff writer David Roberts called for the Nuremberg-style trials for the “bastards” who were members of what he termed the global warming “denial industry.”
Roberts wrote in the online publication on September 19, 2006, "When we've finally gotten serious about global warming, when the impacts are really hitting us and we're in a full worldwide scramble to minimize the damage, we should have war crimes trials for these bastards -- some sort of climate Nuremberg.” (http://gristmill.grist.org/print/2006/9/19/11408/1106?show_comments=no )

Legislating Morality

Mike Adams is a professor at UNC-Wilmington. He is tenured and is therefore not afraid of offending Liberals. How he got tenure is a question I mean to ask him.

He has written an excellent little essay on the subject of the often used, and stunningly false phrase: "You can't legislate morality."

Excerpt:

During the 1990s, liberals stated that legislation designed to cut food stamps was “immoral.” But most liberals also adhere to the belief that you “can’t legislate morality.” How can a bill be “immoral” if it can’t be “moral”?

There are a number of reasons why the colonists declared independence from England. Is it fair to say that the primary reason was that the King was not legislating morally?

The First Amendment clearly prevents the federal government from establishing a national religion. Does it also forbid the federal government from establishing a national morality?

Was the 13th Amendment ban of slavery an example of Congress trying to “legislate morality”? If your answer is “yes,” is that sufficient grounds to reinstate slavery?

Those who say there is no objective standard of morality base their opinion on the inability of people to act in accordance with that standard consistently. But isn’t the absolute moral law more likely to be seen in people reactions, rather than their actions? Think about yourself for a moment. Sometimes you tell the truth, sometimes you don’t. But, do you not react with consistent moral outrage when people lie to you?

Read the whole thing...

al Qaeda's "Working Paper for a Media Invasion of America"

You probably haven't heard much about the efforts of the Global Islamic Media Front - al Qaeda's "public relations" team. The group is well known to those who monitor terrorist web sites, but rarely reported on by the mainstream media. (Although the group's recent release of a video game in which the player's goal is to kill President Bush did get some coverage in the Washington Post.)

But another recent effort from the group won't likely be reported anywhere in the western media - at least not directly. Titled "Working Paper for a Media Invasion of America", the recently translated document was originally posted on a known jihaddist web site, but has received scant public attention from it's target audience. No full translations of the treatise are currently available, but a brief description of some of the content can be seen here.

Najd al-Rawi, the document's author, begins by noting that although they've been successful in many ways, the jihaddists haven't fully exploited the opportunities presented by the US media. Inspired by a video from bin Laden addressing the American people with subtitles in English, the author notes that "It seemed the Shayk wanted to send a clear message to his brother mujahadeen to pay more attention to this part of the mission." He points out that videos from the "Shayks of jihad" are in great demand in the western media.

It seems they have already succeeded.

And this is absolutely true:

And in that we see both the political savvy and naiveté of the Global Islamic Media Front. They recognize the advantage - and relative ease - of turning as many Americans against their President as they can (dividing the enemy into opposing camps to be eliminated in turn being a primary goal of effective propaganda) but fail to grasp the idea that this requires no effort on their part whatsoever. Still - you can't blame them for being willing to accelerate the process, or contribute to the cause.

The theocrats are coming!!!!!

It is amazing what people will believe if paranoia strikes. For example, there is a large and vigorous group on the Left who are warning against the imminent creating of a Christian Theocracy in the U.S.

How do we know there are many people who believe this? Their books are best sellers. And they go to Barbra Streisand concerts (just kidding about the last one).

In The Baptizing of America, Rabbi James Rudin—the American Jewish Committee’s “senior interreligious adviser”—offers a sketch of what America will look like if the theocrats get their way. “All government employees—federal, state and local—would be required to participate in weekly Bible classes in the workplace, as well as compulsory daily prayer sessions,” as would employees of any company or institution receiving federal funds. There would be a national ID card, identifying everyone by their religious beliefs, or lack thereof—and “such cards would provide Christocrats with preferential treatment in many areas of life, including home ownership, student loans, employment and education.” Non-Christian faiths would be tolerated, “but younger members . . .would be strongly encouraged to formally convert to the dominant evangelical Christianity.” Gay sex would be prosecuted, and “known homosexuals and lesbians would have to successfully undergo government-sponsored reeducation sessions if they applied for any public-sector jobs.” Political dissent would be squashed, religious censors would keep watch over the popular culture, and “the mainstream press and the electronic media would be beaten into submission.”

Sadly, Rudin’s book is thin on examples of significant political actors who are proposing taking any of these steps, let alone all of them. What he has instead are the Christian Reconstructionists—the acolytes of the late R.J. Rushdoony—who are genuine theocrats, of a sort, and who also rank somewhere between the Free Mumia movement and the Spartacist Youth League on the totem pole of political influence in America. Yet this doesn’t prevent them from figuring prominently in nearly all the anti-theocrat anthropologies, playing the same role that international communism played for right-wing paranoiacs in the 1950s: the puppet master working from the shadows and the hidden hand behind every secular setback.

Like a diehard John Bircher poring over Dwight D. Eisenhower’s speeches in search of the Supreme Soviet’s marching orders, Rudin scans the utterances of evangelicals and their allies for Reconstructionist language. Did Billy Graham once advise evangelicals to run for public office and take “control” of the various branches for government? Then he must believe, with the Reconstructionists, that “all adversaries must be completely eliminated from positions of authority” and that “to achieve a divine end by any means—including cruelty, deception, and brute force—is justified.” Did Antonin Scalia suggest that government “derives its moral authority from God”? Well, he doubtless intended to issue “a legal green light” to theocrats seeking “to destroy all existing political systems . . . and replace them with their own religion-soaked political regimes.”

Perhaps most religious conservatives, Rudin generously allows, “are unaware of the potent ideology that calls for the dismantling of American democracy . . . and its replacement by an authoritarian Christian commonwealth.” But then, of course, most Eisenhower voters were unaware, in the 1950s, that Ike’s administration was infiltrated and controlled by Communist agents—and more fool they.

Similarly, Kevin Phillips announces that “for all practical purposes, Pat Robertson is a Christian Reconstructionist”—not because Robertson has ever identified himself as such but because his start-up university bears the sinister sobriquet Regent, an obvious reference to the Rushdoonian notion of Christians as God’s viceroys on Earth. Phillips doesn’t precisely accuse President Bush of being a Reconstructionist, but he notes that Bush’s GOP gets an awful lot of votes from the Mormons—who have created “a de-facto establishment of religion in the inner mountain West”—and that the Bush family “has been close” to the Reverend Sun Myung Moon and his cultish Unification Church. And then there’s Bush’s habit of encoding “private scriptural invocations” into his speeches. Not only did the president use the biblically loaded phrases “hills to climb” and “seeing the valley below” in his 2004 convention acceptance speech, but he also mentioned the “resurrection of New York City.” The resurrection. Clearly something sinister is afoot.

Liberal Paranoia

Jonah Goldberg reviews what Liberals believe about Christians:

If the Christian base of the GOP gets its way, “All government employees — federal, state and local — would be required to participate in weekly Bible classes in the workplace, as well as compulsory daily prayer sessions.” We would all have to carry religious identity cards that “would provide Christocrats with preferential treatment in many areas of life, including home ownership, student loans, employment and education.” Non-Christians would be indulged as second-class citizens, “but younger members ... would be strongly encouraged to formally convert to the dominant evangelical Christianity.” Homosexual sex would be illegalized, while “known homosexuals and lesbians would have to successfully undergo government-sponsored reeducation sessions if they applied for any public-sector jobs.” Dissidents would be on the run, the popular culture censored by bureaucratic Cotton Mathers, and “the mainstream press and the electronic media would be beaten into submission.”

All of that is according to James Rudin in his book The Baptizing of America.

Read the rest...

John Stossel on the McDonalds Lawsuit

I have a question for federal Judge Robert Sweet: If your own children blamed McDonald's for making them fat, would you buy it?

Thomas Sowell Tells Us Why Voting is Important

Some people say that there is no point voting because there is no difference between the two major parties, and the other parties have no chance of winning. However, there is a difference: the Republicans are disappointing and the Democrats are dangerous.

'SCARY MOVIE' PRODUCER MAKES CAMPAIGN AD; MOCKS DEMOCRATS

Via DRUDGE

Of go to Powerline.

What Did Kim Jung Il Do and When Did He Do It?

Here's my reply to a Liberal poster who denied that it was the Clinton nuclear plants that produced the material for the North Korean bomb:

Jeremy, my friend … and you are my friend:

I’ll try not to spout off and I appreciate you linking me to the Sig Hecker posts. Be assured that I read them. Unfortunately they don’t support your claims

You are absolutely right that he North Koreans did not get their bomb material from the Clinton reactors. The best summary I was able to get was by Lee Wha Rang.

Having read Sig Hecker’s report to the Senate, he differentiates between what he observed and what he was told. You apparently did not. His group spent one day, from 10:30 AM to 5:15 PM observing the North Korean facilities and speaking with their spokesmen. I was struck by the fact that his observation of the 50 MWe reactor was, and I quote “We drove by the 50 MWe reactor site twice.”

Now you may not have noticed, but Sig Hecker said that his was not an inspection. Driving by a reactor pretty much settles that issue.

So, in summary, I have not reason to disbelieve Sig Hecker. However, there is a phrase in the”Princess Bride” movie that is becoming famous and applies to your tortured interpretation of his report: “To paraphrase: “I don’t think that report means what you think it does.”

So where does that leave us? Well, it probably leaves us with a paranoid little pot bellied runt who inherited the country from his father and who is running it while people are starving and eating the bark off the trees but who is desperately trying to develop a nuclear weapon. Whether he did that this time around is still an open question, but his determination to do so is not in doubt.

I believe that that has been his objective all along and the Clinton/Carter/Allbright agreement gave him enough life support that his economy has managed to survive this long. Oh, the fools I referred to were not alone; the Chinese have a vested interest in keeping this regime afloat because they don’t want 23 million Koreans crossing into China. And South Korea are not particularly interested in stirring the pot since its capital is within a few miles of the border and they would have a hard time with the flood of refugees also. Besides, what would the North Korean military do if the regime collapsed? But Great Leader Kim Jung Il “The sun of the nation and mankind” is determined to be front and center stage and there we are.

Now as to his nuclear ambition, what he did and when he did it, I refer you to this quote from the Congressional Research Service: The Bush Administration disclosed on October 16, 2002, that North Korea had revealed
to U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly in Pyongyang that it was conducting a secret nuclear weapons program based on the process of uranium enrichment.

And this from North Korea Advisory Group Report to The Speaker U.S. House of Representatives November 1999:
North Korea's WMD programs pose a major threat to the United States and its allies. This threat has advanced considerably over the past five years, particularly with the enhancement of North Korea's missile capabilities. There is significant evidence that undeclared nuclear weapons development activity continues, including efforts to acquire uranium enrichment technologies and recent nuclear-related high explosive tests. This means that the United States cannot discount the possibility that North Korea could produce additional nuclear weapons outside of the constraints imposed by the 1994 Agreed Framework.

Thanks for sharing.

The best are killed in every generation

By Dennis Prager.

If you are debating whether to be optimistic or pessimistic about humanity's future, here is a point to consider: In every generation, especially in the last century, vast numbers of good people -- often the best people -- have been murdered by the worst people.

Duke Rape Case: Rape, Justice, and the ‘Times’

NY Magazine does an excellent article about the Duke Rape case and eviscerates the NY Times about its coverage.
[Excerpt...read the whole thing]

“I’ve never felt so ill,” says one reporter about the paper’s coverage of the Duke lacrosse-team case. Luckily, a blogger’s on the story, too.
[snip]

In the movie, Tom Hanks would play K. C. Johnson. He’s the most impressive of the “bloggers who have closely followed the case,” in the Times’ tacitly pejorative construction. But Johnson is the Platonic ideal of the species—passionate but committed to rigor and facts and fairness, a tenured professor of U.S. history (at Brooklyn College), a 38-year-old vegetarian who lives alone in a one-bedroom Bay Ridge apartment and does pretty much nothing but study, teach, run, and write.



Johnson has no connection to Duke. (His B.A. and Ph.D. are from the Harvard of the Northeast.) His attention was grabbed in April by the “deeply disturbing” public comments of Duke faculty that righteously indulged in invidious stereotypes and assumed the lacrosse players’ guilt. “One area that the academy, especially since McCarthyism, is supposed to stand up is cases where due process is denied,” he says.



He usually posts at least once a day—not standard autoblog rim shots, but carefully argued, deeply researched essays running 1,000 words or more. “I need to ensure that it meets what I consider to be an acceptable level of academic quality.” He has traveled to Durham several times. When he wanted to find out if Nifong’s unfair photo lineups were standard provincial practice—they’re not—he spent days talking to fifteen North Carolina police departments and prosecutors.



People assume he’s a right-winger. “I’m a registered Democrat who has never voted for a Republican in my life.” Not that he doesn’t wildly speculate—he is a blogger. I wondered why, after Nifong won his primary, the D.A. didn’t start tacking away from the case, setting himself up to drop the charges. Because, Johnson argues, if it doesn’t go forward, he would be vulnerable to civil suits from the indicted players, and disbarment. “This is someone whose career is on the line. He has no choice.”



The Times has not addressed any of this. For the past few years, I’ve tended to roll my eyes when people default to rants about the blindered oafishness or various biases of “the mainstream media” in general and the Times in particular. At the same time, I’ve nodded when people gush about the blogosphere as a valuable check on and supplement to the MSM—but I’ve never entirely bought it. Having waded deep into this Duke mess the last weeks, baffled by the Times’ pose of objectivity and indispensably guided by Johnson’s blog, I’m becoming a believer.

Harvard study paints bleak picture of ethnic diversity

From the Financial Times:

A bleak picture of the corrosive effects of ethnic diversity has been revealed in research by Harvard University's Robert Putnam, one of the world's most influential political scientists.

His research shows that the more diverse a community is, the less likely its inhabitants are to trust anyone – from their next-door neighbour to the mayor.

This is a contentious finding in the current climate of concern about the benefits of immigration. Professor Putnam told the Financial Times he had delayed publishing his research until he could develop proposals to compensate for the negative effects of diversity, saying it "would have been irresponsible to publish without that".

The core message of the research was that, "in the presence of diversity, we hunker down", he said. "We act like turtles. The effect of diversity is worse than had been imagined. And it's not just that we don't trust people who are not like us. In diverse communities, we don't trust people who do look like us."

Prof Putnam found trust was lowest in Los Angeles, "the most diverse human habitation in human history", but his findings also held for rural South Dakota, where "diversity means inviting Swedes to a Norwegians' picnic".

When the data were adjusted for class, income and other factors, they showed that the more people of different races lived in the same community, the greater the loss of trust. "They don't trust the local mayor, they don't trust the local paper, they don't trust other people and they don't trust institutions," said Prof Putnam. "The only thing there's more of is protest marches and TV watching."

He gets the question right. His answer?

In an oblique criticism of Jack Straw, leader of the House of Commons, who revealed last week he prefers Muslim women not to wear a full veil, Prof Putnam said: "What we shouldn't do is to say that they [immigrants] should be more like us. We should construct a new us."

Right (sarcasm)! All we need to do to fix a multicultural society is to change human nature. The answer is to drop American society and become "Society X?" No problem mon.<BR>
Can I suggest that the old law of holes applies? "When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging."

Pillars of Government Week, Part I :The Military

From Villanous Company:

“Basically, after Vietnam, the general attitude of the American military was that we don’t want to fight that kind of war again,” said Conrad C. Crane, the director of the military history institute at the Army War College, a retired Army lieutenant colonel and one of the principal drafters of the new doctrine. “The Army’s idea was to fight the big war against the Russians and ignore these other things.”

A common assumption was that if the military trained for major combat operations, it would be able to easily handle less violent operations like peacekeeping and counterinsurgency. But that assumption proved to be wrong in Iraq; in effect, the military without an up-to-date doctrine. Different units improvised different approaches. The failure by civilian policy makers to prepare for the reconstruction of Iraq compounded the problem.


I touched on this issue in this post, as part of my ongoing futile attempt to combat the ubiquitous "If only we'd listened to St. Colin of the Fields and his sainted Powell Doctrine everything would be coming up roses" meme, which people who know nothing about the military seem to think is the be-all and end all to everything. The half vast editorial staff have heard more than a few folks in the combat arms wryly refer to the "CYA Doctrine" as an excuse never to fight a war anywhere, under any circumstances, because we'll never have enough troops in today's military. It's a joke, but it's also not too far from the truth.

Read the whole thing...

Bob_and_Tom_-_Telemarketer_Nightmare

Very funny telemarker call.

The Farce Is Strong With This One

If you wonder what happened behind the scenes of the Galactic Empire, this short movie explains everything (rated TV-14, I'd say).

Directly from YouTube

A must see.

Here's another Star Wars spoof.

'Doonesbury' Creator Condemns Muhammad Cartoons

No freedom of speech or the press for Gary Trudeau. Especially if the reader will kill you. Everyone else, not so much. Hey Gary, you offend me.

Gary Trudeau, creator of the 'Doonesbury' comic strip, says cartoonists should draw the line when it comes to offending people. In an interview published in the Santa Barbara Independent:

Q. What did you make of the Danish cartoon mess? I understand that you said you would never play with the image of Allah. But did you feel you should have done so out of a sense of professional solidarity, or to make a statement about freedom of speech?
A. What exactly would that statement be? That we can say whatever we want in the West? Everyone already knows that. So then the question becomes, should we say whatever we want? That, to me, is the crux. Do you hurt people just because you can? Because you feel they shouldn’t be deeply hurt, does that mean they aren’t? Should the New York Times run vicious caricatures of blacks and Jews just to show the First Amendment in action? At some point, common sense and sensitivity have to be brought to bear.

Mark Steyn: Page scandal makes America look silly

There are many legitimate reasons for electors to toss out the Republican Congress, but the notion that they're a hotbed of gay pedophile enablers is not one of them. Had Foley dug in and attempted to cling on, his GOP colleagues would have been all over TV deploring his behavior, calling on him to step down, expressing outrage, etc. After two or three days, a few lefties might even have piped up to assail the Republican theocrat sexual McCarthyites tormenting the poor chap. Had he actually had sex with congressional pages, affronted gay groups would have pointed out this was perfectly legal in the relevant jurisdictions and would have complained ferociously about the stigmatizing of gay relationships and Democrats would have declared there should be places for all at the American table, especially had Foley done a Jim McGreevey and announced that "my truth is I am a gay American." A few quirks of timing and the parties' respective roles might have been entirely reversed. Scandalwise, the Republicans always play the submissive masochists but the Dems are bi-swingers, happy to flay the GOP as either (a) uptight prudes or (b) pedophile enablers, according to what suits. What would have been consistent in both narratives is the assumption by the Democrats, the media and the Gay Page Tip-Line end of the Republican Party is that the electorate is stupid. In the sense that there's any "child abuse" going on here, the American people are being treated like children and abused by the politico-media class.

Mark Steyn: Oh God, am I just being neurotic?

Mark Steyn dissects and then disposes of two authors whose view of the future is remarkable for its stupidity.

There's a similar omission in James Martin's new book The Meaning of the 21st Century: A Vital Blueprint for Ensuring Our Future. Perhaps Mr. Martin got "blueprint" from Barnett's title -- it's one of those buzzwords appealing to the happy futurologist -- although an alternative edition bears the subtitle "An Urgent Plan for Ensuring Our Future." In fact, Martin has produced neither a vital blueprint nor an urgent plan nor an urgent blueprint, vital plan, planned blueprint or blue vitals (a side effect of global cooling?). Rather, his book is a flibbertygibberty gambol through global warming, poverty, nanotechnology, terrorism, hydroponics, transhumanism and anything else that tickles his fancy for a paragraph or two. The author is a distinguished computer scientist and he's big on the big picture: "Every year, because of our misuse of the earth's resources, we lose 100 million acres of farmland and 24 billion tons of topsoil, and we create 15 million acres of new desert around the world . . . One-third of the world's forest areas has disappeared since 1950."

The obvious question here is: who's this "we" you keep banging on about? My small town is more forested than it was either a century or two centuries ago. So clearly the "we" in my part of the world does things differently than the "we" in Sudan or Rwanda or the Brazilian rainforest. But the possibility that political, cultural or civilizational factors might be determinative is one to which Mr. Martin is fiercely resistant. The idea that the human species -- rather than Belgians or Saudis or Fijians -- is responsible for this or that environmental crisis is deeply appealing to the eco-doom-mongers because it casts the problem as a moral failure.

When Martin moves on from these technical problems (which is how we would look at them if we wanted to solve them rather than use them as opportunities for societal self-flagellation), the alleged great thinker retreats into happy-face banality. His section on Islam is the most godawful pileup of Pollyanna generalities punctuated by absurdly overinflated anecdotal evidence, like the fact that the emir of Qatar has opened up a branch of Cornell medical school in his "Education City." "There are aspects of civilization that are common," Martin writes breezily. "Common ethics, the international legal system, networks for commerce . . . " Whoa, hold it there. Has he ever tried doing business in Nigeria or Syria? Not to worry, says Martin. "A growing number of people will think of themselves as citizens of the planet rather than citizens of the West, or Islam, or Chinese civilization." He provides no evidence for this assertion, and I would wager that it is, as they say in Britain, bollocks on stilts: the idea that an identity rooted in nothing more than the planet as a kind of universal zip code will ever be sufficient is laughable. The opposite is more likely to prove true: the more types like Martin promote the nullity of post-nationalist identity -- what he calls "multicultural tolerance and respect" -- the more people will look elsewhere, to pan-Islamism and much else.

Read the whole thing...

What Does the US Do if Attacked and No One Is Responsible?

Belmont Club imagines a scenario in which there is no one we can threaten with retaliation:

But unattributed retaliation against terrorist sponsors only works as long as the terrorist sponsors are sole producers of nuclear weapons. If fanatical cultists like Osama Bin Laden had an independent capacity to manufacture nukes, no regime of proportional retaliation would result in stable deterrence for reasons described in the Three Conjectures. The murderous cycle of retaliation would continue until someone willed himself to do the unimaginable.

Consider a case where Islamic terrorists obliterate a city, causing five times the deaths at Hiroshima and an American limited response. ... In a war between nations, the conflict might stop at this point. But since there is no one with whom to negotiate a peace and no inclination to stop anyhow, the Islamic terrorists will continue while they have the capability and the cycle of destruction continues. ... At this point, a United States choked with corpses could still not negotiate an end to hostilities or deter further attacks. There would be no one to call on the Red Telephone, even to surrender to. In fact, there exists no competent Islamic authority, no supreme imam who could stop a jihad on behalf of the whole Muslim world. Even if the terror chiefs could somehow be contacted in this apocalyptic scenario and persuaded to bury the hatchet, the lack of command and control imposed by the cell structure would prevent them from reining in their minions. Due to the fixity of intent, attacks would continue for as long as capability remained. Under these circumstances, any American government would eventually be compelled by public desperation to finish the exchange by entering -1 x 10^9 in the final right hand column: total retaliatory extermination.

Islamic terrorists which do not represent states but only themselves; which consist of groups answerable to no more than a handful of fanatics yet have the power to kill millions can only be met — if they can be met at all — by the most radical form of excision. There is no stable plateau at which the process of retaliation would naturally halt. There are no ledges on which the falling stone of destruction will catch. Stopping the serial destruction of the world's cities would require a response so dreadful and so unthinkable that almost any effort to win the war on terror to prevent this fantastic exchange would be well worth it.

Sex Scandals and Double Standards

Charles Krauthammer on two parties, two pages, two different outcomes.

IN 1983, REPRESENTATIVE GERRY Studds, Democrat of Massachusetts, admitted to having sex with a 17-year-old male page. He was censured by the House of Representatives. During the vote, which he was compelled by House rules to be present for, Studds turned his back on the House to show his contempt for his colleagues' reprimand. He was not expelled from the Democratic Caucus. In fact, he was his party's nominee in the next election in his district--and the next five after that--winning reelection each time. He remained in the bosom of the Democratic Caucus in the House for the next 13 years.

In 2006, Republican congressman Mark Foley was found to have been engaged in lurid sexual Internet correspondence with a 16-year-old House page. There is no evidence yet of his ever laying a hand on anyone, let alone having sex with a page. When discovered, he immediately resigned. Had he not, says Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert, "I would have demanded his expulsion." Not only is Foley gone, but half the Republican House leadership has been tarred. Hastert himself came within an inch of political extinction.

Am I missing something? There seems to be an odd difference in the disposition of the two cases. By any measure, what Studds did was worse. By any measure, his treatment was infinitely more lenient.

Read the rest...

Weekend Getaway

We took a long weekend to a B&B in Lexington, Virginia. We relaxed, ate, and toured the surrounding coutryside including VMI where "Stonewall" Jackson and George C. Marshall are revered.

Wafa Sultan on Danish television

Click on the link to see the film clip on the Danish cartoon controversy.

Aristophanes in Gitmo

In yesterday's post, I mentioned how I saw the Foley affair (yes, I am the culprit who invented Masturgate but was too embarrassed to admit it ) more as Aristophanes than Shakespeare (farce, not tragedy). After reading Claudia's report on the "dreadful" US prison in Guantanamo, which dovetails nicely with Rich Miniter's, I thought once again that the Greek dramatist is the perfect artist for our times. Who better to describe a trip to Gitmo than the man who did such a brilliant job lampooning Dionsysus' descent into Hades to bring home Euripides? Too bad he's not alive now to satirize the villainous riffraff surrounding the Guantanamo story - the Newsweek "virtuosi" who made up the tale of Koran flushing (where they don't even have flush toilets) and the greedy nabobs of so-called human rights organizations who enrich their coffers by pretending we are torturing Islamic inmates when, apparently, they are growing fat on international cuisine. Dr. Strangelove or even Aristophanes' own The Frogs had nothing on this. Yet too bad indeed the great Greek is not with us today to decapitate the self-satisfied smirk of modern liberalism. Can you imagine what he would have done with a tour of Gitmo by, say, Streisand and Penn?

Comments

On Bob Woodward

The Belmont Club has a good excerpt on the interview by Woodward of Rumsfeld. the comment that struck me most forcefully was this:

Woodward is more a novelist than a reporter.

He sued the authors of the book “Silent Coup” – a far more accurate work than “All the President’s Men” - because it was just that. In another of his books he supposedly interviewed CIA Chief William Casey at a time in which the man was in a deep coma. [this I remember]

His works should be labeled, at most, “Inspired by actual events.” They bear far less relationship to real history than did the TV special “The Road to 9/11” because he seeks to alter facts, ignore other data, and fabricate evidence as required to tell his preconceived story.

Mark Foley Falls Victim To Fitter Species

The Liberal manifesto:

In today's evolutionary struggle we liberals are the fittest species. Conservatives are so easy - accuse them of committing a sin and they resign and disappear from public sight forever. We in the progressive community are much smarter - we don't believe in sin. It makes us invulnerable to criticism. That's why we're taking over this stupid country. However crazy, irresponsible, and outright criminal our behavior is, you can't call us sinful because that would be forcing your values on us. You can't call us hypocrites because we never said we were perfect. You can't say we've lost shame because we can't lose what we don't have. Human imperfection is our standard, our goal, or breeding ground, our primordial soup if you will. We stand for nothing and have no values except those that may hypothetically exist in a distant socialist utopia that may or may not happen.

Show Them Who Is the Boss in France

It is always a mistake to believe that other people view the world from your perspective. For example, the Muslim riots in Europe:

One has to think like the “youths” in order to understand them. Not imagine oneself in their shoes, but imagine their minds in one’s own head. The important question is: how do these insurgents perceive their relationship with society in France?

Unlike their fathers, who came to France from Muslim countries, accepting that, whilst remaining Muslims themselves, they had come to live in a non-Muslim country, the rioters see France as their country. They were born here. This land is their land. And since they are Muslims, this land, or at least a part of it, is Muslim as well. The society they live in is a homogeneous Islamic one. For them that is society, there is no other. Consequently there is also no question of their “leaving” that society to become part of another society, the putative Western one. “Society” is the society they live in and from which they view and interpret what goes on around them. To understand their language we must understand how they see us, where we fit in in their society. Multiculturalism does not exist: it is always a matter of several cultures living side by side in defined territories, and the laws of one culture not applying in the territories of the others.

Click on the link for the entire article. For more from Power Line, click HERE

Victor Davis Hanson: The War and Its Critics

But when you write history, and especially history of a contentious nature about Iraq, in which so much is at stake, it is incumbent to identify primary sources. The last three books about the supposed mess in Iraq—Cobra II, Fiasco, and now State of Denial—violate every canon of intellectual courtesy. Check who said what in Cobra II and you find the following: “Interview, former senior military officer”, “Interview, former senior officer”, “Interview, former Centcom planner,” Interview, Pentagon Officials,” “Interview, U.S. State Department Official,” or “notes of a participant.”

When the readers encounter the most controversial and damning of verbatim quotes in Fiasco, they are presented with “said a Bush administration official” or “recalled one officer.” Woodward is ever more derelict, in imagining not just the conversations, but even the thoughts of characters. And lest one think I am unduly critical in questioning the veracity of these unnamed sources—whose authenticity can never be checked by anyone other than the journalists who now write out popular histories—examine the recent record of journalists at the New York Times and Washington Post, and more recent stories such as the Koran flushing at Guantanamo or the photshopped pictures from Lebanon. But even more specifically, Ricks himself in the course of promoting Fiasco, repeated rumors from unidentified (“some”) sources that the Israelis deliberately exposed their civilians to rocket attacks from Lebanon to gain sympathy from the world community: “According to some U.S. military analysts … Israel purposely has left pockets of Hezbollah rockets in Lebanon, because as long as they’re being rocketed, they can continue to have a sort of moral equivalency in their operations in Lebanon.” He was immediately called to substantiate those unproven charges. After considerable damage done to the reputation of the Israeli Dense Force had been done, Ricks backed down and apologized for his unsupported allegations with a weak mea culpa about his revelations “Ugh. I wish I hadn’t.”

Every source in Cobra II, Fiasco, or State of Denial, may be accurate, but we will never know that, because for a variety of reasons the authors who claim they worked from notes and recordings, chose not to identify the most inflammatory sources by name. It would be as if I wrote a history of the Peloponnesian War and, to support my most controversial points, added footnotes that stated “A manuscript in the Vatican,” or “Private letter to author from anonymous Greek shepherd attesting a stone altar in his field”

Michelle Malkin Photoshopped in a bikini.

Ashley Herzog exposes a photoshop lie about Michelle Malkin - a favorite object of racist and sexist denigration on the Left - and in doing so brings out a truly bizarre defense of lying from a person named Kimberly.

Read the whole thing...

Future women leaders of America beware: if you plan on a career in politics, don’t allow yourself to be photographed in a bikini. Especially if you’re the type of woman who speaks out against the sexualization of young girls, the media will be eager to use it against you.

That is what we learned from conservative author Michelle Malkin last week. After she wrote a column criticizing once-wholesome singer Charlotte Church for her slide into pop star hedonism, left-wing Internet blogs discovered photographs of Malkin on spring break fourteen years ago. Accompanied by headlines like “Michelle Malkin gone wild” and “Michelle, you ignorant slut,” the blogs linked to a photo-sharing page that featured Malkin cavorting with girlfriends and posing in a string bikini.

It seemed like the perfect “gotcha” moment for the liberal blogosphere. But there was a problem: the photo page wasn’t real. I know this because most of the pictures on it belong to me.

...

Kimberly replies:

I'm sorry,
but this wasn't about catching Malkin in a compromising pose or apologizing for poor photoshopping. I doubt that she could ever be as cool as that photo suggested, anyway - even if her head had been bigger.

It was about putting stupidity in it's place. What Malkin does is demean anyone who is different from herself and her ideology - and she does it in a very public arena, a large and often mean audience, without a thought regarding those she ridicules.

It's not that Charlotte Church is a horrible person, it's that she dared speak ill of George Bush. So in Malkin's tiny little predatory brain she sees Church as fair game for her vitriole. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that Church has been the unfortunate recipient of a similar anthrax-like powder-filled envelope as Olbermann was due to Malkin's hit piece. And then to whine about a random blogger's comment on the size of Malkin's head in the photo relative to blow j*bs is pathetic and rather hilarious, considering the source.

Why do Malkin, Coulter, Limbaugh, Savage, etc. etc. etc. continue to harp about "hate" when there is merely dissent, and then rant hatefully against those dissenters? It's sickening and it lowers discourse to the level of photoshopping heads on half naked bodies. Hate breeds hate, people, and no one seems to do it better than this chick.

Anyway, look at the bright side, Malkin got a few good days of martyrdom from the photo (albeit the irony was totally lost on her), it made her look like the vixen she's not and we liberals all got a good laugh from it. But I imagine Ashley's inbox is still empty.

This is the face and voice of Liberalism. It's beyond "fake but accurate."

Class Action Lawsuit Filed on Behalf of WWII-Era German POWs

(Rooters) Washington, DC -- A Washington-based legal foundation Tuesday filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of WWII German POWs and their surviving relatives, charging the federal government with rescinding the POWs' habeas corpus rights under the US Constitution.

The group, co-founded by journalist Andrew Sullivan and left-wing blogger Markos Moulitsas, called "Real Conservatives, Non-Christianists, People-Powered Progressives, and Democratic Party Libertarians United in an Uneasy Coalition for the Preservation of the US Constitution Against War Criminals and Those as Unenlightened as Ourselves," announced the $400 billion lawsuit at an afternoon press conference after filing in federal court.

"The notion that over 400,000 German POWs were held without charges -- and without their habeas corpus rights -- during WWII is a stain on our country's reputation that must be addressed," the group said in a prepared statement.

"We weep for our country that such a travesty has remained swept under the rug for so long. This lawsuit is meant to right those wrongs. Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Gen. George C. Marshall were war criminals and need to be called to account for their actions. Anyone who disagrees with this legal action is clearly not as pure of mind as we are, and screw them, by the way."

Sullivan and Moulitsas also announced in a prepared statement that they would hold an Internet fundraiser for another group, to be called "Two-Bit Conmen Blogging for America," and that "there would be under no circumstances any refunds for dissatisfied contributors."

Sullivan and Moulitsas denied that the impending lawsuit and subsequent fundraiser were publicity stunts, but were rather a "desire to take back America from reactionary forces determined to besmirch America's reputation."

(Tongue firmly planted in cheek.)

ABC ONLINE GLITCH LEADS TO IDENTITY OF FOLEY ACCUSER

A posting on ABCNEWS.COM of an unredacted instant message sessions between Rep. Mark Foley and a former congressional page has exposed the identity of the now 21 year-old accuser.

The website PASSIONATE AMERICA detailed the startling exposure late Wednesday.

ABCNEWS said in a statement: "We go to great lengths to prevent the names of alleged sex crime victims from being revealed. On Friday there was a very brief technical glitch on our site which was overridden immediately. It is possible that during that very brief interval a screen name could have been captured. Reviews of the site since then show no unredacted screen names."

SEX CHAT WAS WITH 18 YEAR OLD

On Tuesday ABC news released a high-impact instant message exchange between Foley and, as ABC explained, a young man "under the age of 18."

ABC headlined the story: "New Foley Instant Messages; Had Internet Sex While Awaiting House Vote"

But upon reviewing the records, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned, the young man was in fact over the age of 18 at the time of the exchange.

A network source explains, messages with the young man and disgraced former Congressman Foley took place before and after the 18th birthday.

Passionate America has the scoop:

And Hot Air has more comments.

I know Zarqawi, the terrorist said to the American. I am going to have Zarqawi cut off your family’s head while you watch. Then he will cut off your h

Patterico tells the interesting story of a male nurse threatened with beheading by a terrorist suspect at Guantanamo.

Battle of Franklin

Franklin Mayor Tom Miller says he does not want Confederate flags to be flown during a commemoration of the upcoming 1864 Battle of Franklin anniversary.

Scowcroft on 'State of Denial'

"I have spoken to Bob Woodward a number of times about a variety of subjects over the years, but I did not agree to be interviewed for his latest book. Further, there are statements in the book, directly or implicitly attributed to me, that did not and never could have come from me. I never discuss any personal conversations that I may have with President George H.W. Bush, and he never discusses with me any conversations that he has with President George W. Bush."

Gay Hobbits? by Mark Rahner

The Seattle Times writer Mark Rahner interviews an NPR “personality” John Moe who tries enter the strange, alien world of Conservatives, much as the National Geographic reporters of the 1940s tried to understand the bushmen of the Serengeti.

One of the things he found is that this strange and exotic group of primitives likes certain movies, including “The Lord of the Rings.” Our reporter opined that he found this strange in view of the fact – as he saw it – that “The Lord of the Rings” was filled with “gay hobbits.”

I asked Mr. Rahner about his interpretation of the film and his view that the Hobbits in it were gay. He responded this way (in full):

There are more longing looks between male hobbits in those movies than in the entirety of "Brokeback Mountain."

Respectfully,,
MR

Not having see “Brokeback Mountain” I am in no expert on the subject of longing homoerotic looks. But I have read the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy – several times – and have seen the movie, And for the life of me I cannot fathom what Mr. Rahner is talking about.

I am loathe to assume that Mr. Rahner is an expert on homoerotica, but in view of the scandals involving leading lights in our country from Garry Studds to Mr. Foley, I have to assume that people like Mr. Rahner are exquisitely tuned to homoerotic longing looks. I would suggest that parents of children who know Mr. Rahner should be very careful.

Howard attacks left intelligentsia

I wish George Bush were this forthright:

PRIME Minister John Howard has launched a scathing attack on Australia's left-wing intelligentsia, questioning its loyalty to the nation over the past decades.


In a speech delivered last night for the 50th anniversary of the conservative magazine Quadrant, Mr Howard said the left had a history of denigrating the nation and was now doing the same with the war in Iraq, describing Islamic terrorism as the new tyranny.

He said Australian universities were still breeding leftists and described pro-communists of decades past as “ideological barrackers for regimes of oppression opposed to Australia and its interests”, Fairfax reports today.

Mr Howard said the left was wrong in its view that the Cold War was an equal struggle between the ideologies of the United States and the Soviet Union.

“It became the height of intellectual sophistication to believe that people in the West were no less oppressed than people under the yoke of communist dictatorship,” Mr Howard said in his speech.

Mr Howard praised Quadrant for its record of countering “stultifying orthodoxies and dangerous utopias that have, at times, gripped the Western intelligentsia”.

Who is really calling for the Republican leadership to resign?

Gloria from Spokane called Mark Levin and said, as an earlier caller did, she had received a call from, “AmericanFamilyVoices.” She added, “they want people to go there and join the chorus.” Mark confirmed that the call was to tell Republicans to call Republican Members of Congress to demand that the Republican leadership resign.



A search revealed AmericanFamilyVoices.org is registered to a Carol of Eugene, Oregon, the Trevelyan Strategy Group, and the CTSG organization. A further search revealed the President of American Family Voices to be Mike Lux who has a very interesting resume:

He is the founder of Progressive Strategies LLC…served at the William Jefferson Clinton White House as a Special Assistant to the President for Public Liaison…Since leaving the White House in April 1995, Lux has become a significant fundraiser for progressive causes and candidates. He was a 1996 Clinton-Gore Finance Committee Vice Chair, and served in the 1996 cycle as a Democratic National Business Council Vice Chair. He has raised money for numerous charitable causes and political candidates over the last three years. Prior to his service at the White House, Lux was Constituency Director on both the 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign and the Presidential transition. Lux was also a senior staffer for the Joseph R. Biden, Jr. and Paul Simon campaigns in the 1988 cycle….

Lux is currently (January 29, 2003) involved in assisting Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) “in assembling and raising money for a new outside organization designed to provide a voice to the party’s progressive wing…”

A search for the Trevelyan Strategy Group linked it to Emerging Democratic Majority, where is says the, “web site and E-newsletter is produced by Ruy Teixeira in collaboration with McPherson Associates and The Carol / Trevelyan Strategy Group.”

In other words, a leftist liberal organization, whose President may also work for Senator Clinton, is calling Republicans to tell them to demand that the Republican leadership resign. Makes you wonder about the still unconfirmed reports that a watchdog group may have withheld Foley’s instant messages and if political hack groups and certain Democrats are in cahoots. I am not saying that they did anything wrong or criminal; I am just wondering aloud.

Boycotting El Loco

Your friendly neighborhood Citgo station is really the branch office of Venezuelan strong man Hugo Chavez's government: The company is a wholly-owned subsidiary of El Loco's state oil company. Having recognized the connection, 7-Eleven Inc. is dropping Citgo as its gasoline supplier at more than 2,100 of its stores. Here's hoping the boycott catches on.

More from Senator Inhofe on Global Warming

Washington DC - On CNN American Morning today, Senator James Inhofe, the chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, engaged in a heated exchange with CNN newsman Miles O’Brien over CNN’s biased and erroneous coverage of global warming. Senator Inhofe questioned the journalistic integrity of CNN anchor for, ‘scaring a lot of people’ with hyped climate reporting. Senator Inhofe also questioned O’Brien about his 1992 CNN report regarding fears of a coming ice age. O’Brien responded by citing the 2004 fictional Hollywood global disaster movie, “The Day After Tomorrow” to back up his science reporting. “This is "The Day After Tomorrow" scenario that we're talking about,” O’Brien said after being confronted by Senator Inhofe on his climate reporting.

Read the whole thing

Did Democrats Page Mark Foley?

From Investors Business Daily:

Scandal: Right after Mark Foley was revealed to have had inappropriate e-mail conversations with a 16-year-old page, he resigned and checked into rehab. Now, what did Democrats know, and when did they know it?

Yes, you read that right: the Democrats. It's of course clear that Foley, a Republican representative from Florida, resigned for good cause. We don't defend him or his inexcusable behavior -- good riddance.

But it didn't take long at all after Foley's resignation for the Democrats to call for an investigation of the entire Republican leadership in the House, charging that GOP stalwarts knew early on that Foley, as they like to say in the rehab business, had a "problem."

Democrats have begun losing their once-significant lead in the polls, and a mere five weeks remain until the midterm elections. Is this scandal the Democrats' own "October Surprise," meant to throw the GOP into a tailspin shortly before the vote?

Recent polls show Democrats aren't doing very well on several key issues. What better way than a good, old-fashioned sex scandal to get people's minds off such things as the importance of winning the war in Iraq, our ongoing vulnerability to terrorist attack and the necessity of keeping the Bush economic boom going?

As it is, Republicans deny knowing about the explicit text messages that Foley sent to a 16-year-old congressional page back in 2003. In repudiating Foley, House Speaker Dennis Hastert called the messages "vile and repulsive."

Despite this, the immediate take by Democrats and much of the mainstream media was that this was a classic example of Republican hypocrisy -- talking "morals" and "values" while all the time shielding a child predator. But it was nothing of the kind.

If anything, the episode reveals the Democrats' hypocrisy about their own behavior. The fact that Foley resigned virtually within minutes of being told that ABC News had copies of his salacious e-mails and text messages indicates he at least felt shame for his actions. Can the same be said for Democrats?

Sadly, it doesn't seem so. How else can you explain the following?

In 1983, then-Democratic Rep. Gerry Studds of Massachusetts was caught in a similar situation. In his case, Studds had sex with a male teenage page -- something Foley hasn't been charged with.

Did Studds express contrition? Resign? Quite the contrary. He rejected Congress' censure of him and continued to represent his district until his retirement in 1996.

Read the rest...

Throwing Conservative Leaders Under the Bus

Mark Levin makes a point:

I thought we already had the House GOP shake-up when Tom DeLay was pushed from office and Roy Blunt lost the race for Majority Leader. Now we have to dump Dennis Hastert too? I remember when Newt Gingrich had to go, only to be replaced by Bob Livingston, but then he had to go, too. I remember when Trent Lott was pushed from office, replaced by Bill Frist. And then I heard rumblings about how Frist had to go because, well, he was ineffective. Meanwhile, the Democrats hang tough, through thick and thin. They slobber all over Bill Clinton, who actually had sex with a 19-year-old intern and abused his office and women left and right. William Jefferson, a Class-A crook, remains in office with no effort by his party to expel him because in a close election, Nancy Pelosi needs him. West Virginia’s Alan Mollohan has become wealthy in office, apparently helping to funnel money to his favorite causes. Sen. Bob Menendez apparently rented property to a nonprofit agency which he helped to receive federal funds. Cynthia McKinney assaulted a police officer, and she wasn't expelled. (The voters fired her.) John Murtha was an unindicted co-conspirator in the Abscam scandal, yet is now touted as the future House Democrat leader. And the media's favorite Republican, John McCain, was caught up in the Keating Five scandal. We have leakers, womanizers, boozers, and anti-Semites in Congress, not to mention Ted Kennedy. And I could go on and on.

Oh yes, I hear we conservatives are better than the liberals, and that we must hold ourselves to a higher standard. But throwing Republican leaders overboard to prove the point without sufficient information is no standard at all. It may make pundits more comfortable and may attract praise from unlikely circles, but it doesn't make us better than liberals. In fact, it doesn't make us better people, period. What we need is information. Most of us only learned about the Foley communications last Friday. Demanding Hastert’s head tonight, as I said in an earlier post, is irresponsible. Among other things, we need to know who was aware of these three-year-old instant messages, only to make them public at a time of enormous help to the House Democrats. Clearly Foley wasn’t the only one exploiting these teenagers.

I’ve been around Washington too long to know that scandals of this sort don’t just happen. Just ask Karl Rove and Lewis Libby. Three years later, most of us are appalled at the Fitzgerald investigation. But when Libby was indicted, many dismissed questions about the investigation as irrelevant to the charges.

Should We Quarantine Gays? The Foley Fallout.

Some of those liberals now shouting the loudest for Mr. Hastert's head are the same voices who tell us that the larger society must be tolerant of private lifestyle choices, and certainly must never leap to conclusions about gay men and young boys. Are these Democratic critics of Mr. Hastert saying that they now have more sympathy for the Boy Scouts' decision to ban gay scoutmasters? Where's Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on that one?

Mr. Foley's explicit emails--which were sent to a former page who had returned home--clearly crossed the line into "vile and repulsive," as Mr. Hastert put it yesterday. And the Floridian has now resigned in disgrace and is being criminally investigated. This is harsher treatment than was meted out in the past to some Members of Congress who crossed another line and actually had sexual relations with underage pages. Democrat Gerry Studds of Massachusetts was censured in 1983 for seducing a male teenage page, but remained in the House for another 13 years and retired, according to the Boston Globe, with a rich pension.

Yes, Mr. Hastert and his staff should have done more to quarantine Mr. Foley from male pages after the first email came to light. But if that's the standard, we should all admit we are returning to a rule of conduct that our cultural elite long ago abandoned as intolerant.

Why Do They Hate Us?

The current depressing debate over whether or not the Iraq War has worsened the terrorist threat and if we aren't now busily making jihadis out of what would presumably be otherwise peaceful people isn't remotely interesting.

Except, maybe, as a lesson.

There are people out there who seem to think that our enemies derive their sole motivation based on our actions. If the United States does this, they do that; should we do that, they would do this.

Tied to this frankly childish view of human beings, cultures and civilizations is a related concept that holds that the source of all conflict is grievance.

Thus, if one (A) addressed the root grievances to a conflict while (B) refraining from conduct likely to provoke those with grievances then (C) peace will prevail.

It all sounds very logical, very rational and very, very moderate and reasonable, so it's no wonder all sorts of well-meaning fools are attracted to it.

What it leaves out, of course, is the humanity of the enemy. The enemy is reduced to a bag of grievances and an automaton who responds only when his buttons are pushed.

Read the whole thing. If you think that the "hate America First" crowd is a new phenomonon, read the rest of the article. Noam Chomsky is a Johny-Come-Lately. The Nazi propaganda of 1939 sounds right at home in 2006.

Where are the severed heads of Jesus and Muhammad in Mozart?

But before we get our Hanes UltraSheers all in a wad, let's stop and think about this one for a second or two. Why is this scene even in Idomeneo? Perhaps we were napping during those riviting classical music appreciation classes in junior high, but for some reason, we don't recall Mozart being a huge fan of agitating your average jihadi-on-the-street.

Turns out, he wasn't:

The disputed scene is not part of Mozart’s opera, but was added by the director, Hans Neuenfels. In it, the king of Crete, Idomeneo, carries the heads of Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha and Poseidon on to the stage, placing each on a stool.

And whatever could Herr Neuenfels' motivation have been? You may want to sit down - this one's a real shocker:

The severed heads of the religious figures, Mr. Raue said, was meant by Mr. Neuenfels to make a point that “all the founders of religions were figures that didn’t bring peace to the world.”

Oh, *do* tell. So now we have another ardent devotee of the First Pentecostal Church of Atheism determined to beam his own special brand of hope and optimism out to the world, come hell or personal explosive devices.

Frances Poretto on Taboo Language, or Why Tony Macrini Uses Racist Terms

The use of “taboo” terms has created a problem in American society. George Allen is exhibit A. So is Tony Macrini.

Frances Poretto makes a compelling case for why this ought not to be.

Before we proceed, allow me to state a few things very, very plainly.

1.I am a Caucasian of Irish and Italian descent, whose parents were immigrants from those lands.

2.My loyalties are to my family and the United States of America. I would defend either or both to the death. Apart from a mortgage and a car loan, I owe nothing else to anyone.

3.What matters most to me about others is their character: their willingness to respect the rights of others and to discharge their proper responsibilities, without whining about any of it.

4.I believe that there is an American culture, and that it is infinitely superior to all the other cultures of the world, past or present. More, I believe that Americans are the finest people in the world -- that no other land produces anything remotely comparable to our general standard of decency, justice, generosity, or good humor.

5.I believe that the races, as conventionally defined, differ in various ways. The importance of those differences is topical and contextual.

6.I believe that the sexes differ in various ways. As with racial differences, the importance of those differences is topical and contextual.

7.I believe that homosexual sodomy is self-destructive, but that, at least in certain cases, sexual orientation can be changed.

8. I believe that there is such a thing as general intelligence, that it is at least partly inherited, and that it varies widely.

9.I believe that the handicapped should receive our sympathy and compassion as individuals to other individuals, but that they are not entitled to more as a matter of right.

10.I believe that laws that mandate preferred treatment for the members of any group, however defined, are both unConstitutional and destructive.

11.I hold these convictions not because anyone else holds them, but because the evidence of my senses and my own powers of reasoning have led me to them.

According to the major taboos of our time, this makes me a racist, sexist, ableist, homophobic chauvinist abuser of the physically challenged. By copping to all this, I've violated all the major, politically correct taboos of our time: about race, gender, sexual orientation, the handicapped, and multiculturalism. Needless to say, the enforcers of those taboos would like to see me boiled in oil.

They can dip their outrage in beaten eggs, roll it in crushed walnuts, and shove it up their asses.
...
I could go on, but I believe the point has been made. The shamans of contemporary linguistic taboos have adopted nigger, faggot, cunt, and the other forbidden words as passwords, emblems of group membership -- and membership, as American Express has been at pains to remind us, has its privileges. No one outside the shamans' circle is permitted to speak the password; it's an arrogation of a jealously guarded status. He who dares must be cut down, ground into the dust, and forbidden ever to speak at all, to any effect, in any context. For as in all systems of nymic magic, the word is deemed congruent with the thing: the taboo words are at the root of the shamans' power. Failure to enforce the taboo would risk the loss of the group's privileges and immunities, laboriously amassed over the decades of exploitation of others' guilt.

Every circle of shamans must have a private language. Better that it be secret, but private above all. The taboo words and their use are all that distinguish the privileged from the hoi polloi. They must be guarded to the death.

Rough language...but it needs to be said.

Mark Steyn: Keepin' it real is real stupid

Whatever good it might once have done, America's racial-grievance industry is now principally invested in its own indispensability. Lavishly remunerated panjandrums such as the Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have a far greater interest in maintaining racism than any humdrum Ku Klux Klan kleagle, assuming there still are any. One consequence is that so-called black "community leaders" will talk about anything rather than what's really screwing up their "communities." In 2003, congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee was reduced to complaining about the racist nomenclature of hurricanes. If I recall correctly, her argument was that blacks were being discriminated against because hardly any devastatingly destructive meteorological phenomena are given African-American names. Apparently, the black community can't relate to some white-bread wind like hurricane Andrew blowing in and tearing up the joint. Why are there never any hurricane Leroys or Latifahs? It's deeply racist and insulting to imply that only forces of nature with effete WASPy appellations are capable of inflicting billions of dollars of coastal damage. In fairness to black leaders, they did not reprise this line of attack when Katrina swept in a year ago, preferring to argue instead that not merely the name but the very hurricane was racist, deliberately deployed by Karl Rove's offshore Republican wind machine to total only black neighbourhoods.
...
At the heart of Enough is a sad but unarguable proposition: "We've made it taboo," says the writer Shelby Steele, "to talk about the words 'black' and 'responsibility' in the same breath." Four decades of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society as mediated by the presidents-for-life of the white-guilt shakedown industry have destroyed the black family and mired it in a culture of self-victimization. From the present wreckage, there are two ways to go: the black leadership can pursue the mirage of slavery reparations, which is a kind of über-welfare and would likely prove just as destructive; or blacks can sideline the present "phony leaders," as Williams calls them, and begin the hard work of rebuilding their families and communities.

Tony Macrini’s macaca.

Who will ever forget George Allen calling a Webb campaign worker who was following him around with a video camera “macaca.” This term, it is alleged, is a terrible racial slur in another language. There seems to be some confusion about what language uses “macaca” as a slur … but never mind.

So why does the terrible racial slur “macaca” come up so often during Tony Macrini’s morning radio show?

For those who don’t listen, Tony Macrini is the radio host of a morning talk show on AM 790. He is on for about 4 hours starting at 6:00 AM and he uses the show to comment on things political. Sort of a down-market Rush Limbaugh without the humor or the style.

Now “macaca” is a funny sounding word and since the radio business is sound business, I can understand why Tony would drag this word out frequently. What I can’t understand is why, if “macaca” is such a terrible slur, why Tony would repeat it at all? I have not heard him using other racial slurs on his show. I’m sure he would not use the “N” word (as we are all now told to call it – if we’re white). Why not?

Why is it bad for George Allen to say “macaca” but it’s just fine for Tony Macrini to use the same word? Is it because Allen used “macaca” to a person’s face and Tony is using it behind people’s backs? Try this thought experiment: substitute the “N” word for “macaca” and see it saying it to someone’s face is worse than using it on the radio in another context.

No, I think I know why Tony feels free to use “macaca” on the radio regularly. He knows that the whole “macaca” incident is a manufactured controversy; the creature of the news media. It is a faux club used to beat up on Allen and taking advantage of people’s gullibility. It is cynical, it is vicious, and … it is racist, but not in the way that it is being portrayed. The racists are the ones who are using “macaca” the way Tony Macrini and the anti-Allen media are using it.

The Big Secret of that Leaked NIE

No issue is more important to our country’s security than the future of terrorism, and nothing could be more helpful to the President than a clear and accurate projection of what that future is likely to be. That is what this NIE should have provided, but doesn’t.

Now you see the “secret” that the Key Judgments of this NIE inadvertently reveal – and it isn’t about Iraq or about the future of terrorism. It’s about our own intelligence service, and what this NIE has revealed is that our radar is busted. That’s frightening, and what’s even more frightening is the realization that if we know it, so too do our enemies.

Rest assured they will be looking closely to see if the President decides to just ignore his busted radar and fly by the seat of his pants – or if he decides to get it fixed.

Excerpt; read the whole thing.